Alcohol producers are using questionable tactics to market their beer and liqour brands in the developing world. This is one of the conclusions in a study covering selected advertisements from seven countries.

81 per cent of African women report themselves to be non-drinkers, says data from the World Health Surveys. This is an important fact to take into account in planning of alcohol prevention strategies and policies.

The United Nations High Level Meeting on the Prevention and Control of Non-communicable Diseases in New York recently adopted a Political Declaration calling for greater measures at global, regional and national levels to prevent and control NCDs.

An editorial by Robin Room, Jürgen Rehm and Charles Parry in the journal Addiction points to the September High Level Meeting of the United Nations General Assembly as an occasion to remedy the relative lack of action on alcohol in reducing the burden of Non Communicable Diseases (NCD).

Zambia needs a stronger NGO voice to promote public health concerns in alcohol policy formulation. This was one of the conclusions in a meeting for civil society organizations in Lusaka on the 10th of June.

Effective legislation is necessary to strictly regulate alcohol marketing activities. This is one of the recommendations in a new report; "Monitoring Alcohol Marketing in Africa", released by WHO AFRO today.

“He asks me why I drank so much while I was expecting him. I don’t really have answers for him”, says South African mother Marion Williams in a recent article of the WHO Bulletin. She lost two of her children in child birth.

A recent editorial in the peer-reviewed open access journal PLoS Medicine asks why medical journals and public health advocates who are concerned with corporate conflicts of interest, inappropriate marketing to children, impotent self-regulation, and general flouting of the rules are ignoring the alcohol industry.

Many governments realize the need for effective legislation to reduce the harm from alcohol use. This is also reccommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) Global strategy to reduce the harmful use of alcohol. But how to do it? WHO Western Pacific Regional Office has offered a guide.